Spotted - Some of the Best Business Number Plates
What are the best number plates for UK Businesses?
We asked you (our Facebook audience) for the best business number plates, and your responses did not disappoint. Businesses across the UK are showing their creative side with funny and unique private number plates. They really stand out on the roads - you’ve probably seen a few yourself!
As mentioned in our Business Guide, business plates are great for “brand building and humour, but they are also a cost effective way to ‘de-age’ and style a fleet of vehicles.”
We didn’t want to just include our favourite plates in this article (that would be unfair) so we asked our Facebook audience about all of the great business plates they’ve seen. So you’ll notice that many of these are accredited to you!
You’re welcome.
So, without further ado, here are some of the weirdest and funniest business number plates in the UK! Stay tuned for the conclusion of this article, where we reveal statistics we gathered through surveys on which number plate styles are best for businesses.
C4 PET
We’ll begin with the plate that started it all!
This is the van picture we posted to invite people to share their plates with us, so it’s only fair that it gets a place in this list!
C4 PET may not mean much on its own (other than an explosive pet, maybe?) but that creative use of the R makes this plate make total sense! Having the R “fall” off the plate in this fun way actually makes it even more eye-catching, which is great for sticking in the memories of fellow drivers.
After all, that’s one of the main goals of private number plates for business, right? You can give a quick chuckle to your fellow drivers, and hopefully they’ll remember your company next time they need to.
84 LE
There must be a very, very hungry horse somewhere, because that is a lot of hay bales. And, hey, Bale! It says it right there on the plate.
This is such a clever and stylish registration that we have to applaud it. Short, distinctive, and clearly recognisable. Finding a plate as good as this one is like finding a needle in a hay bale.
(Though, if you are looking for something like this, it’s way easier if you let us help!)
Our Facebook survey suggests that. when choosing a plate for a pet business, most people prefer "fun" business plates. E.G. B4 ARK!
HAY 848Y
It’s time for more Hay!
This one has the fun of a double meaning, using Hay in place of Hey. It’s also a Suffix plate, which is always nice to see. Plates like this are great for business, as they don’t use the current system of a number representing a year, which can help deage your fleet. I imagine replacing a vehicle this big is not cheap.
Which Hay plate is better? Or, can you think of an even better one?
DEN 715T
Here’s one that isn’t on a van for a change! I guess dentists make enough to drive around in something a bit shinier. This Ferrari is sporting an excellent plate.
This is one of those clever registrations that may look illegal at first glance. But nope! This is a Suffix style plate, and no-doubt a pretty expensive one. Though this isn’t very effective as an advertising plate, since there’s no real way to see where this dentist works, it is very readable and distinct!
Plus, this car is much less scary than going to the dentist, so it gets an automatic 10/10.
B16 MAC
This plate is a great advert, even though the car doesn’t seem to be a business vehicle. Looking at this plate evokes images of perfectly photographed burgers, with lettuce peeking out. Maybe they’re just trying to make their fellow drivers hungry?!
And, it seems to have worked, since both the Bentley and the Photographer are pulled into a drive through! Having a Big Mac as a little treat, perhaps.
Our Facebook Survey suggests that many people find industry+business plates effective. Plates like BU55 PKL work well, because they reference both the company and the work they do.
AWF 100R
We were sent this one on Facebook, and you have to admit, it’s pretty fitting!
AW Flooring really did pick a fantastic registration for their business. Getting both the brand name and the product into one plate? That’s quite the feat. They also get points for spacing the plate legally! The temptation would be to separate the AW from the F100R but this would be against number plate laws, and besides, we think it looks great as is.
Suggested by Alun Williams
M1 NCE
A couple of folks told us about this one on Facebook, but they didn’t include any photos - so we tracked one down. This van comes directly from Patricks of Camelon’s Facebook page - and if you haven’t guessed yet, they’re butchers!
The creativity of this private number plate, and the way it’s presented on the vehicle, is so fascinating. Including that text on the front to invite the eye down to the private plate is a clever trick. This is a prefix style plate that really takes advantage of the fact that 1s and Is look the same on a UK number plate, meaning the plate looks like one uninterrupted word!
This one is also legally spaced - which is surprisingly rare among private plates for businesses. This is a great registration that works really well for the business that selected it! 10/10!
Marketeers are always seeking out new opportunities. A number plate can be seen as space. A well-chosen plate can be funny, distinctive and memorable.
Suggested by Eve Scott and William Cochrane
D1 SCO
This is a fun one - another suggestion from our Facebook audience. D1 SCO might not seem like a very business-y plate, but this one is used by a DJ!
This is a great advertising plate, because it will immediately appeal to a target audience. Anyone driving along behind who is a fan of Disco immediately knows that this DJ has their best interests at heart.
Although a couple other commenters pointed out that this would be a great plate for a Discovery (and we’re inclined to agree) there’s no doubt that this is also the perfect plate for a DJ who’s ready to boogie.
Suggested by Mike Watson, example image generated by us
WHO 5HYT
This probably isn’t the first plate of this “comedic genre” that you’ve ever seen. Toilet humour plates seem particularly popular among plumbers. And, well, we can’t blame them! With all the publicity they get in articles like this one, it’s an obvious move.
Private Number Plates and plumbers go hand in hand, like private number plates and poo jokes. We’ve actually got a whole bunch of Poo plates available, if you happen to be a plumber.
However, even though the plate is about poo, we still think this van could do with a quick wash. You don’t need the birds to help you commit to the theme, the plate already says it all.
Unfortunately this number plate is mis-spaced so we can’t advocate the van being used on the public highway for legal reasons!
Our research shows that people search for the word "poo" on our website around 6.12 times per day on average
Found by one of our team
UR10 CKS
This plate may be mis-spaced (and pretty dirty) but it’s very easy to understand. This locksmith van has locksmith stickers, and a lock plate. A three pronged fork of lock-based marketing.
Though a quick car wash might help the message to shine a bit more. Just saying.
UR 10CKS is still a perfect match.
PAP3R
Oh look! A paper plate!
You may struggle to eat your mini sausage rolls and crisps off this plate (well, you could try, but we wouldn’t recommend it). However, this plate has plenty of other benefits!
A short and impactful registration, PAP3R is great for an office worker, a paper salesman, or anyone who’s working to make paper.
It is technically illegally spaced. Which is a shame, because PAP 3R is still perfectly readable when printed properly.
W124 RDS
This one is a sneak peak at a longer article that’s coming your way soon. Driving Wizards are a stunt driving company, responsible for some of the most dynamic action car scenes that you’ve seen in cinema.
When they contacted us about this plate, we were so excited. It’s always nice to see a good plate go to a good home, and what could be better than a company that’s as excited about motoring as we are?
Plus, it’s so perfectly on brand. It’s almost magical.
If you’ve seen a good or funny registration like those above, let us know! It may end up in a future article.
Or, use our search on Plates4Less.co.uk to find a funny plate of your own!
Finding The Best Business Number Plates? Best Practices
We recently asked our Facebook Audience to choose between plates from a few different categories. These were: Fun, Investment, Industry, Business, or Industry and Business! See the example below for what we mean by these subheadings.
Over the last year we have noticed that our business client base has more than doubled.
The first time running this survey, we asked people to vote on the plate for a bus company named PKL. Our Facebook audience voted for a plate that combined the industry and the name of the business: BU55 PKL. This is a great plate and we won’t deny that it has plenty of appeal! However, we ran a vote internally, and our Search Team actually voted for something different.
The winner of our internal vote was HO11 DAY, the plate from the Fun category. Our experts recognised that there are many marketing benefits to choosing a fun plate that people will want to share online. Namely, people on their holidays may want to take a picture with the plate for social media, and it is more instantly recognisable as a word than BU55 PKL is. If you see the bus in traffic, you may not know that their company is called PKL, but you’ll know what a holiday is!
Of course, on the other side of the argument, having PKL on your plate can help people to learn your company name, improving brand recognition. Each plate has a benefit!
Since there was no conclusive result from this first poll, we ran another one. This is the dog walking poll that you can see in the image above! The result this time was much more unanimous, with our search team and our facebook audience both agreeing on the greatest plate. Can you guess?
Yes, the undeniable winner with the most votes across the board was B4 ARK - the fun plate! You all loved this one, and so do we. It’s a fantastic plate for any pet business, such as a dog walker, breeder, pet salon or pet store.
But what does this actually mean for any business owners out there? Well, overall, it means that plates in the Fun category were most popular across both tests. So, if you are considering getting a private plate for your business, then you can use this as a jumping-off point for your search.
On the other hand, you could consider that people voted for different categories across these polls, and so there’s clearly an interest in a variety of different private plates, and each kind of plate tends to have its own benefits. There’s evidence of this in the funny registrations listed above.
C4 PET is an industry plate, AWF 100R is a business name + industry plate, and WHO 5HYT is a fun plate! Even though they have drawn from different inspirations, all three of these plates have proven themselves to be great business plates.
If you’re looking for your own business plate, visit www.plates4less.co.uk/4business to learn more! Or, if you know what you’re looking for, you can go directly to our smart search here to look for the plate of your dreams!
Have you seen a funny business plate that you think is better than these? Let us know on Facebook and we may feature it in an article!
Will I get an invoice for the registration number?
Yes!
Can I claim back VAT on a Private Registration if it is bought through my business?
In certain circumstances, yes.
Are number plates a good investment?
Yes, when chosen wisely!
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